Chats, kept

The story that happened over text, kept.

You write here. They answer from Google Chat, on their own account. Their messages, photos and reactions land in the archive, and the exchanges you keep go into the book.

Chats

The week they were sick played out in texts, one fever reading at a time — the truest record of the mission, and it lives in a phone and an account the Church closes within months of release. The letter tells it afterward, tidied; the texts tell it as it happened.

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  • Every message is written to the archive before it is sent to Google Chat.
  • Private threads open only for the two people in them. A parent sees that one exists, not what is in it.
  • Their first words are kept when they edit a message, and nothing that reached the archive is removed by a chat action.
  • Photos they send become archive photos, dated and filed to the area they were serving in.
  • The biographer asks one short question on their preparation day, in a thread of its own, and files the answer beside the question without guessing.

How it works

1

Write here; they answer there

You type here. The message is saved to the archive first, then posted into your missionary's Google Chat space with your name on it. They reply from Google Chat. One toggle sends your words in the mission's language.

2

Every reply is pulled in

Their replies, photos, voice notes and reactions are pulled into the archive every few seconds while the thread is open, and by a sweep that keeps checking when it is not — so a reply still lands when nobody is looking. A reply can reach your phone; one tap translates it.

3

Keep what matters

Most of a chat is logistics. When a run of messages tells a story, press Keep a story, tap the messages, name it. It joins the archive beside the letters, each speaker named, and the book draws on it.

On the printed page

What ends up in the book

  • A kept exchange, printed in the letters section of the area where it happened: its title, day headings, and every line attributed by name, dated to the day it began.
  • Your missionary's own words from a kept chat become source material for that area's chapter, where the narrator may put quotation marks only around words they actually wrote.
  • Photos they send in chat, dated and filed to the area, printable like any archive photo.
  • What they told the biographer in chat, one short question at a time on their preparation day, filed into the chapter for the area the question was about.
  • No words from a private thread, unless the person in it — or an archive manager — keeps them. A photo sent in one joins the family's photo archive like any other.

Questions

Does my missionary need a new app or a login?
No. They are invited to a Google Chat space on the account they already have, and they reply there. Every message and photo you send arrives with your name in front of it. They never log in to the site.
Can I read a sibling's private thread with my missionary?
No, and that is deliberate. A private thread opens only for the two people in it. On the Family page you decide who may open one, and you can see that a thread exists and how many there are. You cannot read it.
Does every text end up in the book?
No. Most of a chat is logistics, so no text you and your missionary send each other reaches the book unless someone in the thread keeps it: one message, or a run of messages kept as a story with each speaker named. What is kept joins the archive, prints with that area's letters, and the chapter can quote from it.
What happens to the chats after the mission?
Every message and kept story is text, and the written archive stays readable, free, forever — long after the Church has closed the missionary's account. Photos and voice notes sent in chat stay live through the mission and six months after; without a vault they may then move to sealed storage that can be restored.

The story that happened over text, kept.

Start your archive

Everything else it keeps